The group as a whole posted revenues of SIT 36.8 billion (€155m) in for 2003, while its core business, which is mainly concerned with poultry processing, increased sales revenues by some 38 per cent to SIT 28.2 billion (€119m) in 2003.
Company chairman Roman Glaser told a national business publication that both figures were in line with set goals. Last year Perutnina Ptuj invested around SIT 5.9 billion in upgrading and expanding its production facilities.
The group has now concluded its consolidation into an international group of food processing companies. The chairman said that for this reason it was difficult to determine the exact net profit for the company, but that estimates were currently running at SIT 600 million, a slight improvement on the figure for 2002.
Looking to the year ahead, Glaser said that the investments in its manufacturing operations were expected to show dividends and that increased product volumes would feed higher sales.
For 2004, Perutnina Ptuj said that it is expecting to generate some SIT 30 billion for its core business revenues and SIT 39 billion for the group as a whole.
For sales by region the group said that 66 per cent of its sales had been achieved from the domestic market, with the majority of other sales coming from former Yugoslavia.
The group is aiming to increase its presence outside the domestic market, with a special focus on the former Yugoslavia. Evidence of this aim came this week when the group announced that it would be constructing a €6.5 million factory in Croatia for the production of sausage meat.
The company said that it expected the factory to be up and running by 2005, bringing the number of factories in Croatia to two. The factory will operate under the company's Croatian subsidiary name, Perutnina Ptuj-Pipo.